Kim Chang-ryong

Infobox Korean name


imgwidth=178px
hangul=김창룡
hanja=金昌龍
rr=Gim Chang-Ryong
mr=Kim Ch'angnyong

Kim Chang-Ryong (1920-1956), was the right hand man of Syngman Rhee, the first president of South Korea. He was assassinated in 1956 by army colleagues.

Early life

Born to a poor peasant family in South Hamgyong Province, during the period of Japanese rule, Kim Chang-Ryong enrolled like many other young Koreans in the Japanese army in Manchuria. Formerly an MP (Military Police), he soon became a reputed detective, whose work was to uncover moles in the Japanese intelligence service and resistance activists. In 1941, in order to arrest Wang Gunlai (王近禮), a Chinese spy master, Kim disguised himself as a beggar and got a job as Wang's delivery man for his department store. Kim even had himself arrested several times until he obtained Wang's trust. The Japanese military eventually caught about 60 agents from the Soviet Union.

Homecoming

After the Japanese were defeated by the Allies in 1945 and Korea was liberated, Kim Chang-Ryong came back to his hometown Hamheung, then part of North Korea and under Soviet occupation. At that time, he was wanted by the Communists for his acts done as a Japanese detective so he kept a low profile so as not to be noticed. At the end of year 1945, he allegedly visited his friend and former assistant Kim Yun-Won (金允元) in Chorwon but the latter sold him out to the Communists, who sentenced him to death for "anti-Korean deeds", i.e. arresting resistants against the Japanese occupation. But as Kim was carried on a truck to the place of his execution, he jumped off the vehicle and escaped through the mountains in freezing weather to reach a relative's house three days later. Recovering from his wounds, he was waiting for the right moment to flee to South Korea. But then again Kim Chang-Ryong was betrayed and captured by the Reds, who sentenced him to death a second time. However, Kim managed this time as well to escape, killing with a chair the Soviet soldier who was guarding him. He then fled to South Korea, solely accompanied by his wife. It is possible that his relatives who remained in North Korea were executed.

outh Korea and the Korean War

Kim Chang-Ryong arrived in Seoul in May 1946 and joined several different corps of the ROKA (Republic of Korea Army) to eventually be assigned to G-2 (intelligence). Kim, knowing how life was in North Korea, had sworn to himself that he would never let South Korea become like his former country. He thought thus he had to prevent South Korea from becoming a communist country. Moreover, he found yet another enemy in the army, which was corruption. He was since then determined to get rid of both of them. In addition, Kim Chang-Ryong obtained President Syngman Rhee's trust by arresting Kim Sam-Yong and Lee Joo-Ha, two key members of the South Korean Labor Party (Nam-Ro-Dang). Rhee, who knew that controlling the army was the only possible way to maintain his regime, saw Kim Chang-Ryong as an efficient officer who could "clean up the mess in the army" and get rid of anyone threatening Rhee's position (Kim himself could not politically threaten him since he had served in the Japanese army and thus could never be appreciated by the people). So Kim Chang-Ryong was Rhee's ideal right hand man and because of this favored connection, he became reckless in investigations and inevitably made countless enemies among the army officers, many of whom were involved in corruption business or pro-communist activities.Kim Chang-Ryong, now a superior officer, formed with the support of US Army officials the US CIC or Counter-intelligence Corps. This was the unit responsible for arresting and interrogating thousands of assumed North Korean spies. Gen. Douglas MacArthur and other American officers even nicknamed him Kim Chang-Ryong "The Snake", in regard to Kim's relentlessness, which was so that by July 1949, a little less than 5,000 soldiers and officers of the ROKA had allegedly been arrested and interrogated. Of course, the CIC had several innocent people arrested and was blamed for that.

Death

In 1953, then head of the Korean CIC, Kim Chang-Ryong was promoted to a Junjang (Brigadier General) and then, in 1955, to a Sojang (Major General), a fact which indeed exacerbated the resentment that the other officers (including most probably Park Chung-Hee, President of the Republic of Korea from 1963 to 1979) had against him. Kim's enemies had already tried several times to assassinate him but all attempts had failed until then. Yet, in the early morning of January 30, 1956, Kim Chang-Ryong left home in his Jeep Willys accompanied by his driver but a car blocked the road. As he shouted at his visitors to get off the road, they shot him several times and got away. Kim Chang-Ryong, then aged 36, was taken to hospital where he died.

Controversy

Because of his relentless investigations, Kim Chang-Ryong was hated so much by a majority of the Korean people that his wife and kids even had to flee to South America, as the press said that “even his family is ashamed of him and abandons him”. Still nowadays, the young Koreans, being taught that he was a war criminal, dislike him, a resentment much emphasized by the claim of former leftist president Kim Gu's murderer Lt. Ahn Doo-hee that Kim was the mastermind of the assassination. Kim Gu's relatives even called the government to exhume and get Kim Chang-Ryong's body out of the National Military Cemetery of Daejeon (a trial is currently in process). Despite what is said, Kim Chang-Ryong's involvement in the assassination of Kim Gu is not definite.Fact|date=June 2007 The chief of the operation was Major Chang En-san,Fact|date=June 2007 then the commander of the artillery corps, who himself got arrested by Kim Chang-Ryong in July 1950, before being shot to death in Daegu. Moreover, Kim Chang-Ryong was in 1949 (the year of Kim Gu's assassination) only a young officer and could not be given this duty at the time.

ee also

*Kim Gu
*Ahn Doo-hee
*Park Chung Hee
*Counter Intelligence Corps
*Syngman Rhee

External links

*http://www.kimsoft.com/2002/kimchangryon.htm
*http://www.kimsoft.com/1997/cic.htm
*http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/books/Lineage/mi/ch7.htm
*http://www.ysfine.com/wisdom/wk03.html
*http://www.korean-war.com/Archives/2001/09/msg00010.html
*http://www.k-state.edu/history/specialevents/Eisenhowerlecture/eisenhower7.htm